


like i've never been

by silver-sparks (Madame_Marauder)



Category: Minecraft (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Resurrected Wilbur Soot, Self-Loathing, Touch-Starved, Wilbur Soot Needs a Hug, Wilbur Soot gets a hug, Winged Wilbur Soot, Wingfic, the wilbur soot special:, u know those fics of tommy braiding techno's hair? yeah that but
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-16
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-24 15:35:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30074448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Madame_Marauder/pseuds/silver-sparks
Summary: Wilbur dies as passably human, and is dragged out of the void with wings made of smoke and stardust and soot, a birthright he had never received.There's just the small matter of caring for them, and possibly himself in the process.Or; in which a father's advice is an absolute last resort, touch starvation and emotional constipation are a bitch, and two brothers bond.
Relationships: Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit
Comments: 18
Kudos: 313





	like i've never been

**Author's Note:**

> title: eight, by sleeping at last
> 
> if you take this as ship im gonna dissolve ur fingernail beds. dont be fuckin weird

When he's dragged from death, it's not in the state he died in. It's not in the truest form of his soul, or in the way he pictures himself, or any of that shit. He is a dead man returned to life, and that makes him exactly as much of a monster as one would expect. He is piecemeal, patchwork, streaks of silver in his hair and blue stains on his fingertips. His eyes are too dark, full of void and shattered starlight, and his voice sometimes thrums like the strings of a cello. Dream had revived him once, and done it carelessly. The godling does not act out of love, of devotion, of care. He does not sacrifice a piece of himself to resurrect the dead. Wilbur has nothing of the would-be god's in him, at least no more than anyone else does, and that is a small mercy.

Phil had tried to revive him twice, had put his heart and soul into it, and thus he had given a part of himself to his son. It's thrilling and terrifying and troubling all at once, because Wilbur cannot count the times he had wished for it, and yet now it is here and he doesn't fucking know what to do.

Which explains why he's sitting on the roof of the rebuilt community house with Quackity, having one of the most awkward conversations of his life.

"I say this from experience," Quackity tells him, his voice that rare sort of solemn. "You might be able to do some of it on your own, and you might be able to fly like that for now, but you need to find someone to preen your wings."

Wilbur sets his jaw and looks away. Call him proud, call him stubborn, call him paranoid, but he's incredibly aware of the fact that being incredibly vulnerable like that is an incredibly bad idea. "Phil managed to take care of his alone."

Quackity raises an eyebrow at him. They don't like each other much, don't get along once they actually start talking, but wings are something sacred. To have wings, quite literally, is to have a target on their backs. It's enough to call a truce, no matter what resentment might linger over elections and explosions. "Are you going to go to Phil about this?" he asks pointedly. 

And that is the question, isn't it? To go to the father whose blood has finally come out, who had done exactly as he asked, who could tell him everything he could need to know, or not? Going to Phil would be going to Techno, to the tundra, to a place just as cold as the ice that seems perpetually lodged within his bones. He knows that his father would ask him to stay, and he knows that he probably would. It would be fine, if not for the fact that his family is a zero-sum game, and he the addition and subtraction in question. To side with his father and twin is to side against his son and brother and most everyone else he knows. To side with his father and twin is to side with Dream, thanks to the favor they owe and the past alliance they hold.

He cannot side with Dream. He's certain of that, can taste it in the back of his mouth like a sickly-sweet reminder.

"No," he sighs, because he clearly cannot go to Phil about this. Quackity gestures silently, a wordless _well, then._ Wilbur rolls his eyes. "I'll figure it out myself."

Quackity shakes his head. "I get being touchy about it, man. Preening is a big thing. Only the fiancés get to touch these feathers," he replies lightly, ruffling his own wings, somehow still deadly serious. "But you said you managed to take off from the ground?"

The change of topic is a blessing. "I've seen Phil do it often enough to copy it," he replies, and the conversation moves easily enough from there. Neither of them quite know how to fly properly; Quackity is mostly self-taught, and Wilbur is basing his own attempts on what he remembers watching Phil do. Between the two of them, they've at least figured out the basics, even if that meant sneaking into Eret's castle and shoving each other from the towers. 

It's a weird not-quite-friendship, because they like very little about each other and the eldritch tendencies don't help matters, but it's better than flying blind. It's better than not flying at all. It's better than being totally on his own.

The problem is that Wilbur, despite the massive wings and void-dark eyes and return from nothing, remains _Wilbur_. He is still exactly who and what he used to be in life; a lonely, bitter, weary man who ruins most everything he touches. He's trying to be better, sort of, in fits and starts whenever he has the energy to bother. For better or worse, he's less of an actual person and more of a tired pile of feathers and clothing that can usually be found on the seventh floor of the Big Innit Hotel.

He'd tried to warn Tommy that keeping an undead eldritch monstrosity in a guest suite would be bad for business, but the kid had almost cried, so he'd let himself be led into a room too nice and collapsed onto a bed too soft and kept his mouth shut about how strange it all still seems.

Because he's trying, alright? He's trying to be less- less _whatever the fuck he is,_ because most people are terrified of him and bad at hiding it, because Tommy can't look him in the eyes, because even Ranboo occasionally flinches at the sight of him. The only person who doesn't seem at least a little unnerved by his presence is Eret, because like recognizes like, and the monarch had simply offered him a spare pair of sunglasses. 

He'd slammed the door in their face. He almost, _almost_ regrets it.

So he stays in the hotel most days and teaches himself to fly at night, like the monstrous creature he is. It's harder than it should be, even with Quackity's advice, even with an understanding of the theory, but he's not desperate enough to go to Phil. He can glide consistently, can land decently, can take off well. He just can't do much else.

Quackity looks at his wings in worry, wincing slightly, but doesn't comment. He doesn't have to. They both know why he's having issues steering.

Wilbur _does_ look after his wings, _sort of,_ in the same haphazard way that he _sort of_ takes care of his hair and _sort of_ remembers to eat and _sort of_ bothers trying to sleep. He's just not very good at it. It's fine. It's definitely, totally fine.

(It's not fine.)

There comes a time where even he has to give up on his denial, though, because even he can't lie to himself beyond a certain point. His wings are more of a mess than he's seen anyone's be, even when Quackity was still wrapping his up in bandages and hiding them beneath a suit jacket. Flying is getting harder at this point, not easier, and he really needs to do something about it before he grounds himself permanently. Life sucks, living sucks, but at least the quiet of the night sky is close enough to the void to be less suffocating than any other place in the world. It's a tether that he can't afford to lose.

But even with motivation, Wilbur does not have the tools needed to properly preen his own wings, nor the experience to use them correctly. He had preened Phil's wings as a child, just as Tommy had, just as Techno inevitably does now, but he'd always just used his hands instead of the fancy wooden combs. It'd worked just as well, kneeling at his father's side, moving half on instinct and half on instruction. He may not have inherited the wings, then, but he'd certainly had a sense of how a pair were meant to be. It just doesn't extend to his own, because he physically cannot reach parts of them.

Quackity had offered to help him, but there's no way in hell that he's taking him up on that. Phil would know how, and by extension Techno, but there's a dozen reasons that he can't go to them. He's stuck. He's _fucked._

The ceiling creaks as he stares up at it, collapsed on the too-soft mattress with his doomed wings spread wide. Tommy is pacing again, no matter how late it is at night. He-

_Tommy._

Oh, he'd never hear the end of it, but his little brother knows how to do at least the bare minimum. Not that Tommy wants to see him, much less touch the wings that look like the expanse of death itself. Not that Wilbur really has any other option.

He shoves himself upright and drags himself up the ladder before he can quite think this through. He doesn't let himself process his choices enough to regret them until he's already standing outside his brother's room, halfway through knocking. Fuck.

Tommy doesn't look too great himself when he opens the door, which is oddly reassuring. He's obviously been running his hands through his hair out of stress, and there are bags under his eyes. Wilbur carefully doesn't meet his gaze, because nobody likes staring into the void. "Wilbur? What are you- what do you need?"

"Hey, Tommy," he says, staring slightly to the left of his forehead, his voice as even as he can make it. "I, uh. Well."

Tommy grimaces, tries for his old attitude, fails miserably. "You, uh?"

"I need your help with my wings," Wilbur replies hastily, as if hurrying the words will make them less humiliating. This was a bad idea. This was a terrible, stupid idea, and he never should have gotten out of bed, and he should really find a way out of this mess he's just made. "I- nevermind. I can just-"

"Shut up," Tommy snaps, and he does. His little brother is staring at him, trying to read his expression, looking absolutely baffled. "You want me to preen your wings?"

This was a worse idea than founding L'manburg. This was a worse idea than holding an election in L'manburg. "Yes."

_"Me?"_ Tommy asks incredulously.

Wilbur grits his teeth, because he's not ashamed enough already, thank you. "Who else am I supposed to go to? Phil, wherever he's fucked off to this time? Techno? Motherfucking _Sapnap_?"

Tommy opens his mouth, closes it. "You're trusting _me_ to do this?"

And isn't that the real problem, and doesn't it unnerve him deeply. "Yeah," he says. It tastes like hope, and it tastes like defeat. He'd asked Quackity, standing up on Eret's tower, if flying for the first time was like a leap of faith. Quackity had told him it was more like an utterly terrifying but ultimately necessary plummet towards the ground at high speeds. He'd been right.

This is another utterly terrifying but ultimately necessary plummet. There seem to be a lot of those when it comes to having wings.

"Yeah, I am," he repeats, and pretends that he isn't mildly nauseous with fear at the thought of it. It's probably fine. Tommy will just say no, and then he'll have to figure something else out, and it's just a question of how much shouting there is.

Except that Tommy takes a deep breath, opens the door wider, and says, "Okay."

"Okay?" Wilbur echoes, stunned.

His brother exhales. "Okay. I'll help with your wings. Come on, big man."

He feels a bit like crying, but he blinks it away and steps into his brother's suite instead. There's a big soft piece of unidentifiable furniture in the midst of the room, an ottoman or a seat or a table, but Tommy gestures for him to sit on it. He does, and his little brother sits behind him, so close that he can feel his body heat. He's pretty sure he's not the only one with shaking hands. This entire situation is so, so fucked up. He's returned from the dead, finally inherited what should always have been his, and neglected it so badly that he's turned to his clearly-frightened little brother for help.

"Let me see," Tommy says, fighting to keep his voice steady. Wilbur pulls one leg up to brace himself against, takes a last moment to consider how bad of an idea this is, and extends his left wing. 

His little brother touches it hesitantly, and he feels a bolt of realization that when Quackity had told him wings were a sensitive thing to touch, he'd meant it on multiple levels.

He almost pulls away, because _oh gods, someone is touching his wing,_ but a part of him also wants to collapse then and there, because _oh, gods, someone is touching his wing_. Tommy isn't even fixing any of his feathers, just running his hand over the tops of them, trying to work up his own courage. That's fine. 

What's not fine is the fact that each light touch burns with the heat of a thousand suns, strange and foreign and warm. Tommy brushes his fingers over the curve of his wing and Wilbur gets lightheaded, already overwhelmed. It's not the best sign in the world.

"I'm out of practice," Tommy admits, which makes sense. He and Phil haven't been close in a long, long time. "This might take a while, okay?"

Wilbur just nods, because he's finally started fixing things, and he's a little bit speechless. He had known, logically, that it would be somewhat of a relief to have his wings straightened out and looked after. He hadn't realized that it would be _nice_.

Sue him. _Nice_ isn't exactly part of his vocabulary except as a sarcastic impossibility. 

Distantly, academically, he had known that it would be good. Preening is a bonding activity between friends and family, a display of affection and trust and love. Of course it would be nice. The simple fact remains, as does the strange feeling in his chest that feels concerningly close to awe; being preened is nice. Being cared for, if only hesitantly and temporarily, is nice. His head spins slightly, which is familiar, but for unfamiliar reasons. Instead of the sudden presence of pain being what shoves him off-balance, it's the sudden absence of it. It's the fact that someone is touching him without hurting him. It's the fact that Tommy is very slowly, very gently, very carefully helping fix his wings.

He wraps his arms around the leg he already has drawn to his chest, because he can't actually name the last time that someone had touched him outside of a fight, not gently. They'd shoved each other jokingly, sometimes, dug elbows into sides and ruffled hair and punched lightly, but even during the revolution there hadn't been much gentleness. He just wasn't made to be handled carefully.

Tommy meticulously straightens bent feathers and tugs out broken ones, intent and focused. His hands aren't shaking like they were when he opened the door; Wilbur is the one trembling now, and doing a shit job at hiding it. He just- he just doesn't know what to _do_. He's never been the one to have wings to look after, never been the one whose nightmares necessitated a family cuddle pile. He's not the one who can just sit there and be taken care of. He's not the one who gets to curl up in the midst of his family and have all their care and attention focused on him. He's not the one who gets any of that.

"You good?" Tommy asks, and Wilbur suddenly realizes that he's just flat out shaking. It takes him a moment to make his voice work, and Tommy sets a hand on his back, and he shudders. "Wil?"

"I'm good," he says, nevermind how his voice cracks. "I'm fine. Keep going."

Tommy hesitates, but does. Wilbur could cry, but he's trying very hard not to. Now is not the time nor place for a breakdown, no matter how much his nerve endings feel like pleasantly fuzzing static. He is not going to start sobbing over a few gentle touches and a scrap of comfort. He is not. He is _not_. 

He hums tunelessly instead, because it's better than choking on silent tears. Tommy hums back at him, harmonizes, builds two thirds of a chord. It's an old, old response, probably not even conscious, just an instinctive habit from the days when Wilbur just wanted to make music and Tommy just wanted to be like him. It's fragile, delicate, glass or crystal balanced on a knife's edge. Wilbur carefully moves up half a step; Tommy mimics him. He hums a pattern; his brother follows.

Gods, his chest hurts.

He carries on anyway, because it's better to think about keys and chords and little melodies than the fact that he's slowly melting into the only kind touch that he's felt in years. Tommy follows his lead, easy and light, his movements a little more confident for it. He finishes the left wing to the tune of an old lullaby that Wilbur had learned from a childhood friend, and it takes a moment for the winged idiot in question to realize that he needs to move and extend the other wing. He doesn't much want to, because the world is soft and warm, moving as thick and slow as melted honey. On one hand, he's incredibly comfortable.

On the other hand, now that he knows what his wings are _meant_ to feel like, the faint discomfort in the other one has turned to aching pain. He stretches it out slowly, carefully, and wraps the left around himself. Tommy shifts, scoots over to the right side, and gently guides his wing into a spot he can work with. He's more confident on this side, moving a little quicker but no less carefully, which is fine. The longer this takes, the longer the window of opportunity for Wilbur's voice to give out as he starts crying in relief. As it is, he already abandons two or three tunes just to trail off into a meaningless hum. It's like floating in water, this feeling of being almost weightless, of drifting, of- relaxing. That's it. That's all it is. He's relaxed.

He still wants to cry. It's such a small little word, _relaxed_ , and it doesn't seem able to hold so many things inside of it. One single word doesn't seem like it should encompass the thousand tiny details that he is suddenly aware of; the texture of his pantleg as he rests his chin on his knee, the tingling feeling of his feathers being shifted into their proper place, the exact amount of space between him and his brother. The easy rush of air in and out of his lungs, untroubled and even. The slow, steady, almost lackadaisical beat of his heart, calm in a way that he can't remember being. The weight of his eyelids gradually growing heavier and heavier. The fact that Tommy bites his nails shorter on the right than on the left. The way that his shoulders drop and wings droop. The taste of cocoa and swiftness lingering in his mouth from when he'd woken up. It's all so small, yet so much, and it can hardly be contained in seven measly little letters.

And yet.

Time moves painfully fast and blessedly slow, and it seems like both a century and a second before Tommy is running his hands over the last few feathers. His movements are soft and sure as they smooth over his wings, his hands steady. Wilbur inhales, exhales, and reluctantly pulls himself in the general direction of coherency.

"Better?" Tommy asks cautiously, letting his hand fall. It makes his chest ache, the loss of contact, but it's nothing he shouldn't be used to by now. "I didn't fuck anything up, did I?"

Wilbur shakes his head, clears his throat. "You did good, Toms. Thank you for fixing them."

His little brother pauses, and then moves to sit at his side. He doesn't hesitate to tuck his wing around his shoulders, because that's what Phil always did, but he probably should've, because that's what _Phil_ always did. Tommy doesn't seem too fazed by it, at least. "No problem," he says, and somehow his hand finds one of Wilbur's. He glances down, and Tommy glances up to make purposeful eye contact, if only for a brief moment. "Thank you for trusting me to."

He drops his face against Wilbur's shoulder before he has a chance to respond, which is fine, because he doesn't know quite _how_ to respond. Tommy has always had a way of brushing aside the details and finding the core of an issue, knowing exactly what the heart of a problem is, figuring out the root of other people's emotions. It's not really surprising to have the truth of things laid out so plainly, and yet he's somehow startled. It's true. He _had_ trusted him to do it, if only because he hadn't had time to actually think it through.

That's something to unpack later. Much later. Later enough that he doesn't have to think about it.

He opens his mouth, but the words of course die on his lips. There's nothing sure about it, nothing sure about it happening again. "Yeah," he says instead, and buries his face in his brother's hair. Tommy is a warm, half-familiar weight against his side, leaning into him without his usual hesitation, and he smells like the same kind of lavender shampoo that Techno used to use back when his haircare routine revolved around something other than soaking in the blood of the unworthy.

His brother is quiet for a brief moment, thinking through something, but heaves a sigh. "You can come ask me to help earlier next time," he says quietly. "Before they get bad, I mean. Just, like, whenever."

"Aww, Tommy," Wilbur replies, running on sheer instinct as his brain comes to a screeching halt. An open excuse to spend time with him. _Whenever_. Given to _him_ , the void-thing with eyes darker than the dried blood on his hands. If his chest didn't already feel like it was being crushed beneath the weight of emotion he doesn't know what to do with, it would now. "Did you actually enjoy that?"

Tommy huffs, shifts uncomfortably. "Ey, dickhead. It's, uh. Techno says that helping Phil with his is a _meditationative_ _exercise_ , or some shit. And it's not that bad, really. Just something to focus on and shit."

"Meditative," Wilbur corrects. Tommy scoffs, but doesn't comment. It's true that his twin had found it calming, and it's not unbelievable that his brother would, too. "If you really want me to, I will."

"Good," Tommy says, and presses into him further. It takes a moment to realize what he wants, but Wilbur hesitantly wraps him up in his arms, then his wings. His brother clings to him in return. "Just don't be like Phil, you feathery bitch."

There are a dozen things that could mean- don't be distant, don't be flighty, don't leave me, don't, don't, don't. All of them are easy to agree to. Wilbur tightens his awkward, unpracticed embrace, and presses a quiet kiss to his brother's hair, because this much he can do. This much he remembers how to do. "I won't," he says. "I promise I won't."

And they both fall silent, clinging to each other, trying very hard not to think too hard about this mess that is their lives. Tommy mutters a joke, and Wilbur chokes on a startled laugh, and for a moment they aren't a dead boy and an undead monster, not mismatched exiles, not revolutionaries or soldiers or leaders. They're just a pair of brothers, laughing at an insult to their deeply fucked-up family, as close to peace as they ever seem to get.

It's nice. It's good. It's enough.

(When he launches himself into the stars the next night, he fucking soars, easy and light and free. His wings are darker than the sky itself, the blue-grey tips of his feathers just the right shade to match the clouds, the silver speckles shining bright and radiant in the moonlight. He tilts a wing and wheels higher and higher on a warm updraft, no aches or pains from trying to fly with unkempt wings. This time, his dive is perfect, his landing decent, only stumbling slightly as he snaps his wings open and alights on the hotel roof.

He's met with Tommy's cheers from the balcony a floor below, and he feels like he could die of the blazing warmth in his chest.)

**Author's Note:**

> slight formatting + tag corrections, ignore the edit i posted this at 1am lmao


End file.
